Books published by Free Association Books

The author asks what it means to be a man, and what part masculinity play in men's identity. What is it like to have to spend so much time and energy in managing that identity?

With maternal love as the prototype for all types of love, Odent examines the short, but critical time just after birth which has long-term consequences for our future capacity to love. The author looks at love holistically and in terms of the hormones which affect it in different parts of life.

In 2011, Englishman Robert Mullan began an almost impossible film project: namely, to finance and shoot a film in 3 languages -Lithuanian, Russian and Polish- neither of which he could read, write or speak.

Government ministers, social work managers and university academics all strive to shape social work education and training. But what do social work students themselves think about their education, their courses and practical training? This book uniquely focuses on the student experience. The author has experience of teaching social work at

Examines the social, political and health policy contexts within which alcohol treatment policy has emerged and changed since 1950. Three themes emerge in the book, including the role of research and how it influenced the nature and direction of policy.

Breastfeeding is a globally recognized imperative for the preservation of infant health, and governments around the world have introduced breastfeeding promotion measures. Drawing on child development theories and neuroscience research, and anthropological opinion, this book explores the myths and reality surrounding this practice.

Contains information that contributes to our understanding of twin relationships as well as twin loss.

Infertility has a major impact on the lives of people. This title is written for the many couples who, following diagnosis of infertility, desperately want an account of the problems of infertility and the help and services available.

In this book, the author traces the philosophical origins of empathy and its development, with Freud and the first psychoanalysts, up to its "re-discovery" in the 1950s, in parallel with changing views on countertransference.

The book discusses the sometimes unhelpful modification of feelings through the use of alcohol or drugs. Practical measures are explained whereby clients can help themselves through work at home, doing their own exercises of relaxation, guided imagination, and journal work.

This is Joyce McDougall's most comprehensive clinical and theoretical book. Its title conveys her tolerant stance toward human differences and forms of deviance. It is among the wisest and best-loved psychoanalytic works ever written.

Applies poststructuralist and postmodern ideas to issues of health and health care to provide a radical re-think of how health is to be understood. This text offers a perspective in which health is seen as an affirmation of potential rather than a narrow biopsychosocial construct.

How did a magnificent rescue operation become such a common way of giving birth? And how safe is it really? Why do some countries have 10 per cent of caesarian births, and some more than 50 per cent? Why have risky procedures, such as forceps deliveries, not been eliminated by the C-section? What is the birthing pool test?

A distillation of the author's 25 years experience of working with children whose parents have divorced. A positive approach suggests interventions based on knowledge and understanding can greatly improve the situation for both children and their parents.

Looks at the social problems encountered by those involved in the adoption and fostering of children who have been sexually abused. This book includes chapters on recognizing the signs of sexual abuse, helping children talk about their experiences and support services available.

This is the story of a Roman Catholic priest in the grip of a new fanaticism - the bigotry that gripped many priests in the wake if the Second Vatican Council - and of his consequential sudden descent into madness.

This volume brings together the works of those who have studied Fairbairn's ideas most closely. The papers are expository, exploratory and illustrative and cover all aspects of his life, work and influence; contributors include the most eminent students of Fairbairn in both Britain and the USA.

This work provides a detailed and rigorous analysis which locates reproductive technologies in the historical context of the progressive technification of the management of human life, and their relation to the social and medical discourses on femininity, maternity and infertility.

Compiled from anecdotes the author collected both from informants and from published sources, the book journies through major categories of human experience that are of interest in the late 20th century including imagination; thought and concepts; language; morality and discipline.

Among the issues discussed in this volume are: the ethical implications for the analyst contemplating and negotiating the stages of retirement; the pressures in the analytic relationship that may contribute to unethical enactments; and the ethics involved in the sensitive area of publication.

This work is about bridging the current deeply-held divide between sentience and reason. It focuses on the pragmatic role of sentient experience and its unceasing and inseparable interplay with the exercise of reason.

The question of diachrony has been the author's preoccupation throughout his psychoanalytic career. It was at the centre of the debates during the era of structuralism and opened many issues for psychoanalysis. This work completes ideas put forward in "Time in Psychoanalysis", its companion volume.

This text examines the emerging concerns about the export of trauma experts and counsellors to war-torn areas of the world. As well as presenting an analysis of present, misconceived attempts to give help, the book provides an agenda for future, more appropriate ways of responding.

The author's pioneering work on the archetypes and the self in childhood has spanned almost 50 years. This title includes descriptions from Fordham's practice, and experience of infant observation studies, and provides basic conceptions on which the Jungian approach to child analysis if based.

This book aims to provide an overview of the lifework and thought of five thinkers in contemporary psychoanalysis. Over a period of two years, Anthony Molino conducted and compiled these interviews. The interviews concentrate on interpretations of each analyst's work.